OpenContent ... or BitTorrent?

garym — Tue, 17 Aug 2004 17:44:17 -0400

Although this page has had tens of thousands of page views, I do wonder: is it useful?

Keeping this page in sync with the releases takes some effort to monitor the release directories and then hand-edit the Open Content Network links -- that's a lot of bother if most people who arrive here either don't have Java (so their download reverts to plain HTTP) or if they just use the BitTorrent (most Linux distros configure Mozilla to automatically handle BT links).

So what say you?

* I should keep the Open Content Network links even if they occasionally get out of sync, at least they let people know the list of mirrors where they can find the ISOs, and besides, the BitTorrent maintainers are very often weeks behind the release dates.
* or should I just keep links to all known BitTorrent hosts and a few HTTP mirrors and let people sort it out on their own.
* or did you just find this page was frustrating because it wasn't what you thought it was and leaves you no better off than when you arrived!

Comments?

Mandrake Linux Download (OCN)

garym — Wed, 17 Sep 2003 16:16:20 -0400

be nice to your mirrors ...

Download Mandrake Linux
via Open Content Network

Looking for BitTorrent links for the latest ISO's? You can click to the Mandrake QA BitTorrent downloads (use this direct torrent link for 10.1-Official-Edition)
or download your Mandrake Official or Community editions from
Linux ISO BitTorrents from Usagi. Also, new with 10.1, you can grab the All in One DVD Edition via BitTorrent.

Unofficial Bit-Torrents: 10.1-Official is also availble on some the off-shore Torrent servers ...

Mandrake 10.1-Official via EastGame.net -- needs more global participation, but the speed isn't terrible.
Mandrake 10.1-Official via the Godfather -- Don Vito Torrent's edition is unfortunately without seeds at the moment, so I can't tell you much about the throughput.

IMPORTANT: Downloading ISO images via OCN requires a javascript-enabled browser, you must allow pop-up windows and you need Java 1.4.1 (which includes JavaWebstart).

If you don't get it, you just don't get it.

MAKE YOUR MOVE: Mandrake Move is here! -- Want to test drive Linux but aren't quite ready to commit half your hard drive? Download the new Mandrake Move ISO and run the world's most favourite GNU straight off the CD

So what is this? It's a peer-to-peer file-trading network where we all share the load of downloading popular files. Basically, you get some, I get some, you give me some, I give you some, and when everyone is doing this all together, we can all get the ISO files without killing the server. Does it work? You bet it does. Prepare to make your ISP very angry with you ;)

Click each ISO disk name to download -- click the links for each ISO file and then sit back and watch the Tornado WebRaid plug-in auto-install (first time only) and boot up your OCN download ...

Mandrake 10.1 (Official Download)
Mandrakelinux-10.1-Official-Download-CD1 Mandrakelinux-10.1-Official-Download-CD2 Mandrakelinux-10.1-Official-Download-CD3 This is the current official release version of the Mandrake Linux install set. Download these ISO images, burn them to a CD-R and boot your computer from Disk 1. You may not need all three: You can start with disk one if you just want a basic system (such as a server/laptop) -- disk two contains extra (mostly developer) tools and disk 3 is the international support and a truckload of goodies; you can install all three to start, or start small and add software from the other CDs as you need them.
MandrakeMove 2 (Live CD)
MandrakeMove (Linux on CD) The fourth ISO CD is a new feature, a live bootable MandrakeLinux distribution on one CD -- no installation required, just put it in your CD drive and re-boot. (you might need to set your BIOS for CD-boot) --- ideal for the traveller to use with a home-dir on a USB stick from a software-challenged Internet Café and an excellent low-risk way to see if Mandrake Linux is the GNU for you.
Mandrake 10.1 (Community Edition)
Mandrakelinux-10.1-Community-Download-CD1 Mandrakelinux-10.1-Community-Download-CD2 Mandrakelinux-10.1-Community-Download-CD3 You can help us make the next release of Mandrake even better by testing out these pre-release editions from the Cooker. The 'Cooker' is where all of us together work to produce the next version of Mandrake Linux; reasonably stable beta candidates can be downloaded here, but you take your chances. you must never ever ever mix 'cooker' packages with current release packages -- that's a recipe for very bad juju.

Not sure if Mandrake is for you? Want some convincing? check the blog world beat!

IMPORTANT: After downloading, your browser will continue to serve portions of the ISO files to other downloaders; this is how we all share the distribution load!

If this really bugs you, just exit your browser or hunt down the top process number for JavaWS and kill it.

ATTENTION FTP SITE ADMINS: Just for the record, I have a lot of trouble setting the seed mirror for this download because very few of you are serving ISO files as binary content. A pox on ye who know not of mime tables and application/octet-stream (you bring shame on all our houses!)

If you're curious about where you're pulling content, who you're serving and how much, click into your local client status page.

- Mandrake Linux Download (OCN) - Comments

OpenContent ... or BitTorrent?

Mandrake Linux Download (OCN)

Download Mandrake Linux via Open Content Network

Download Mandrake Linux
via Open Content Network